Tears stream down the girls eyes. “But that’s different. I never knew them.”
“You barely know me either,” April confesses. “Promise you’ll do it when the time comes.”
“I’ll try.” The child looks away.
“Please, just take the gun,” she says.
Emma pulls the weapon closer and glares at it between her legs. When she looks closer, she can see her grandfather’s fingerprints curve along the handle like small memories.
From the attic window, Emma watches the dead slowly filter away along the back of the house. A few stragglers remain, trampling the garden, and peering in through the broken out window of the kitchen. She counts each body as they pass out of sight around the corner, a lesson her grandfather had taught her. He told her to watch the dead, to look for patterns in their actions, to stay one step ahead of them.
She looks back at April as she sleeps; her chest rises and falls erratically as if she were at the edge of coughing. A thin film of sweat covers her face and dampens her hair, pressing it against her brow. She takes the pistol from the floor and aims it at the woman’s sickly frame. The weapon is heavy, causing the barrel to sag towards the floor before she clasps it with both hands.
Emma struggles with the thought of having to shoot the woman and lets the barrel of the gun linger downward until it points at the floorboards. As quickly as she retrieved the weapon, she lets it fall with an empty thud and runs off towards the trap door. She crouches down and holds tightly to the frame of the door, letting her legs dangle freely over the side.
Emma drops down to the second floor where her grandfather’s body cushions her fall. She rolls to the side, refusing to look at the body. Quietly, she hurries to the stairs and checks the windows for the dead before moving off to the kitchen. Her .22 is still leaning against the door frame where she left it. Grabbing the small rifle, she returns to the living room and grabs her pack: a military satchel her grandfather had given her with a parachute and wings embroidered on the front flap. She tosses the sling of the weapon over her shoulder and begins to fill the satchel a couple boxes of ammo that her grandfather kept on the bookshelf.
When she was old enough, her grandfather taught her how to shoot. He fastened a potato to the end of the rifle to mute its report and showed her how to aim.
“Now it’s not going to be exact, so you’ll have to allow for the potato,” he said with a smile. “But you’ll get the idea before long. Just aim a few inches higher than normal.”
Emma spotted a body about a half a block away and aimed the rifle just above its head.
“When you’re ready to fire, take a deep breath and pull the trigger on the exhale,” he instructed.
The weapon hardly jumped at all when Emma fired, but the round hit home, dropping the corpse in a single shot. She looked up at her grandfather’s smiling face.
“See? That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
From a shelf above the fireplace, Emma picks up a small book and looks at its title: Wilderness training guide. She places it into a compartment in her pack next to the field guide that she has always kept there and proceeds to the kitchen to gather some food. She takes her bear from the counter and stuffs him in with her things.
She keeps quiet as she shuffles through the cupboards and places cans into her bag. She can still hear the dead moving around the house as the wander away and knock against the walkway. She can still smell the sour from their bodies.
“If you’re ever out in the wild, the best way to figure out if something is poisonous is to rub a little on your lip. If it stings or leaves a rash, don’t eat it,” Jacob warned.
“But why do I need to know that, grandpa? You’ll be there to help me.”
“Sweetie, I’m not always going to be there. These are the things you’re going to have to learn if there ever comes a time when we’re apart.”
“I don’t understand. You said you will always be with me,” the child inquired.
“Emma, I’m getting old. There will come a day when you will have to go out on your own. The sooner I prepare you, the better off you’ll be.”
“But, Grandpa, I don’t want you to leave me.”
“There won’t be any choice. Now you need to remember the things I’m telling you, so pay careful attention.”
She stuffs a couple sealed packages of dried food in her pack that her grandfather saved for an emergency if they ever had to flee. As a corpse wanders past the kitchen window, it sniffs the air and shambles off out of view. Emma stays still until the creature is gone before stuffing in a few more items.
A hissing moan issues from upstairs and Emma’s eyes go wide. She knows that she has to go before the thing that was once April figures out that it isn’t alone in the house. Throwing her scarf around her face, she grabs her jacket and leaves through one of the windows on the side of the house and out through the walkway.
She stays quiet as she passes the dead, keeping low and still if they begin to sniff the air.
Something catches in her throat when she imagines her grandfather. She looks back to the house as she sneaks through a small alcove alongside the gate that only someone her size could fit through. She hesitates for only a moment; just a second to capture the fleeting memories.
Emma looks skyward, catching a glimpse of April through the attic window. The woman’s face is pale, almost ghostly as her cheek makes contact with the glass. Her eyes are vacant and void, nursing an emotion reminiscent of hunger and desperation as she stares downward at the little girl. Her face smears along the glass and her mouth opens wide as if at the cusp of an unanswered question. Her eyes are pleading as she silently asks Emma to come back with an expression of want.
The girl adjusts the bag on her shoulder as she heads out along the boardwalk, keeping a watchful eye on the dead that wander in the distance. Her heart stammers with loss, echoing with her weary footfalls. She can smell the dead burning in the distance and guides her footsteps in the other direction.
She removes the potato from the end of the barrel of her rifle and tosses it aside with a frown. There’s no need to remain silent anymore, no need to be as careful as she had once been when her grandfather was with her. She knows that she can outrun the dead; she’s faster than they are, more cunning, and she has so much more to lose.
“If anything should ever happen to me,” Jacob said, “head east. Get into the wilderness, and trust no one.”
“But, Grandpa, you’ll always be with me,” she replied, dismissively.
“I’m afraid that there will come a time when I won’t be able to keep on fighting.”
“No,” she shook her head. “I’ll be there for you, Grandpa, and I’ll never let you go.”
Jacob smiled at the child and patted her on the head, “Just remember what I said, head east into the wilderness and trust no one.”
“You’re being silly, Grandpa. You’re invincible.” She slowly pronounced the last word.
Jacob let out a deep laugh. “All the same,” he smiled, “you’ll still need to remember.”
The shiny compass gleams in the midday light, refracting the brilliance of the sun against its stained, brass surface. The needle points northward and Emma stares off to the northeast, imagining plush forests, running streams, and scampering wildlife.
She tightens the laces on her shoes and walks off alone, repeating her grandfather’s words, “Head east into the wilderness and trust no one.”
·15
The light is blinding as Johnny trudges out onto shore. He squints and tries to make sense of the scenery. Up the bank, he pulls himself along, tired and weary from fighting the dead. Another few feet and he collapses into the sand, letting the fine granules cradle his bruised and battered body.
Overhead, he can see birds swooping down through the sky, sailing off toward the shoreline, banking hard as they vanish beneath the dunes. He drags himself a few more feet and peers out toward the beach. Charred bodies litter the shore, stiff bent limbs claw out to th
e sky, burnt in petrifaction.
He forces himself to stand. His feet sink into the sand and he holds still to regain his equilibrium. The world spins for a few turns while he waits out the nausea that threatens to erupt from within.
Amongst the charred remains, the living dead wander aimlessly, howling as if mourning the fallen. Black, putrid things wander from the ocean like tar covered reminders of oil spills from long ago.
Johnny breathes slowly and stumbles toward the neighborhood beyond the sand. If anyone were to see him, they might think him to be just another body, wandering in search of something to quench its thirst. He stumbles, corrects himself and pauses as he waits for the lightheadedness to subside.
Along a narrow set of stairs, he notices a few drops of blood and follows them to the sidewalk above. He can see marks along the concrete where it looks as if something had been dragged. To his right, he spots a single shoe. He leans down and his eyes go wide when he realizes it is April’s. With new found strength, he follows the tracks; the tiny droplets of blood and tire marks that were left in the mud from the previous storm.
He silently prays that she’s alright, that he can see her smiling face again. No matter the severity of the argument, or what tragedy had befallen them, Johnny would always love her. She was one of the very few things in life worth living for. And now, as the world crumbled around him, he was reminded of that very fact.
When the dead came from the tunnels like a swarm of locust, he managed to escape through a set of grates and out through a side tunnel, but not until after they had nearly torn him apart. All he could think about was whether April was all right. In the face of terror, he had realized what she meant to him. He found that she was the only thing keeping him alive, the only pinpoint of light in an otherwise blackened landscape.
His pulse races as he forces himself forward. The dead are gathering behind him, following as closely as their stiff and withered legs will allow. As he calls out her name, the dead moan in return as if answering his tormented pleas.
There are more of them ahead, clustering in groups around a house, overlooking the beach.
He screams her name again, but the answer he receives is the surf and the echoing call of corpses.
Johnny hears a tapping, light, almost inaudible at first, but it grows louder as he turns himself around in a panic, looking for the source of the sound. The tapping turns to wet scrapes and he looks upward to the attic window of the house.
“April?” he mouths the words in faint disbelief. “No, April. No.”
His face wears a scowl of solemn shock before the tears come. The feelings knot up in his stomach and force him to lurch forward. As the sadness sways, wrenching at his guts, he can hear the dead approach. The dragging feet, the wet slap of dislodged meat slapping against decay. He welcomes their hunger to take him away, to tear the scraps of pain from his writhing soul.
There is no life here, only death and pain and the inevitable end.
He prays for quickness in their gnashing teeth, for the speed of their devouring mouths to reprieve him of the hurt. On his knees, he can see her now, her eyes tearing through him, wandering about in his deepest suffering. She laps at the glass, clenching her jaw and snapping at the obstruction. For a moment, he can hear her clearly. He can hear the sympathy of her voice, and the reasoning in her words. She’s telling him to run.
His head rises and he can see the dead shuffling towards him. He looks up at the window and April is gone. He rises to his feet and staggers for a few seconds, watching the sunlight play at the moist wounds on the corpses bodies. Turning, he scurries away, favoring the pain in his legs and aching that drifts over the rest of his body. Holding back the urge to cry out, Johnny stumbles, drags his leg and moves down the boardwalk.
That is what life had always been about; the need to struggle on, the continuation of life, to live through the worst that the world has to offer and remain standing at the end. It made him sick to think of how many had died when they no longer saw fit to keep on fighting. This is what April would have wanted, she would have told him so herself if she were able. She would have told him to never quit. She would have told him that his life was worth so much more, no matter whether she was with him or not. But he can’t manage to see how he can keep going on, along and beaten.
As the dead amble behind, he thinks of getting away, of living for another day, of what it would be like to be alone. The ache in his body grows as he looks back one final time, hoping to see April again, but his eyes waver and settle on the mass of bodies that follow. He feels like them now, beaten, bruised, haggard, biding his time until the rot finally takes away the man that remains.
Even stumbling, he is faster than they will ever be. He pulls himself along on weak limbs that only work through adrenalin and fear, cramping in tight spasms that nearly make him fall to the ground and give in to the mouths that follow.
He sees her face as he stumbles along and smiles at the memory. The fair skin, the blue eyes, the careless features of her face transcending through the worry and regret - climb slowly into his heart where she will stay forever more.
As he walks, he looks over his body, at the rising welts and the bruises that are already beginning to form. He looks for blood, for bites, for any exposed wound that would indicate that he’s been infected. Through the tears in his clothes, all he can see is welted skin.
Along the beachfront, he scours his surroundings, looking for a way to lose the dead. He can’t give them the satisfaction of his flesh. He turns down a narrow skiff of street and looks towards a cul-de-sac. There, at the very end of the road is a block wall. Jutting up from the ground, an electrical box calls out as a step to the other side. He stumbles along, weary and hurt. His eyelids are heavy as they trace over his eyes like sandpaper against glass.
He waits, bides his time, and allows the dead to come closer. Their voices rise as they spot him like hungry dogs lapping at the wind, searching for food. They bite at the air, at the promise of taut skin, at the living thing that waits for them to feed.
Johnny steps up onto the box and grabs the top of the wall, looking over his shoulder to make sure they are still coming. He pulls himself up and drapes his legs across to the other side.
Still, they draw nearer. On withered legs, they come.
When the first of them are only a few feet away, he leaps to the other side and lands in soft, rain soaked grass. He lies there for a moment, listening to their rasping voices, muffled from the other side of the wall. He breathes softly, taking in the smell of the grass and the soil and the flowers that grow nearby. For a moment, he feels like laying there forever, forgetting the dead, forgetting the past, and letting the void of sleepy eyes and aching bones take him away to lonely dreams.
He lets the blades of grass pass through his fingers, lets their dampness linger on his palms, and allows the softness to pull him in. In his blissful daze, he hears a tapping like an S.O.S. signal. At first, he believes that he’s imagining it, but the tapping becomes louder, more aggressive as he lies there, unmoving. The taps turn to scrapes and he peers up from the ground, lying on his belly and stares toward the house.
There in the sliding glass door, a body quivers, smearing itself along like a snake, unaware of its own limitations. He lets out a sigh and rises to all fours. The weight of his body threatens to drop him back down, but he grits his teeth, tenses his muscles, and gets to his feet.
The abomination slaps away at the glass, wavering drunkenly through the vertical blinds. It tosses back its head as if it weren’t in control of its own neck and slams its forehead against the pane with a thwack. It rolls its head to the side, awkwardly and bashes against the protrusion again.
Johnny breathes rapidly as he stands, staring at the creature. Every muscle in his body screams out in pain as he tries to find a way out of the back yard. Every section of the wood fence resembles the next and he tries to focus his eyes to make out the details. He works himself toward the side of the home, keeping
a vigilant eye on the corpse that bangs against the glass door. The corpse snarls and stares back.
He fumbles with the latch on the gate, lifts the lever and slides it over slowly. Even his fingers ache as they refuse to cooperate, dropping the latch once the gate is open. He stumbles out into an alcove covered with bending trees that shade the sidewalk from the blaring sun. A wispy wind arises once he wanders from the cover of vegetation, bringing the salt air from the ocean into his nose. He holds his breath for a moment, savoring the fresh smell, a smell that rarely comes over rancid decay.
His life is without meaning, without purpose as he considers going on without April. He can’t find a point to living in this burning nightmare. Nothing has substance beyond the hateful dead and the sweet wind that laps at his skin. If he could grow wings, he would soar into the sky, fly past the images of angels that streak his imagination, and dive into the sun. He would let the fire melt away his regret and cleanse his soul. He would proudly burn for the chance of freedom.
Unable to decide where else to go, he makes his way through the streets, heading back to the apartment he shared with April. He decides to struggle past the dead and over the iron gates that surround Mike’s place. Once inside, he will head to the roof and ponder death. Maybe this time he will be able to jump.
No matter whether April would have wanted him to live or not, he can’t seem to find a reason to keep struggling. He yearns for the sweet release of cold concrete, for the bones snapping within the husk he has become. He wants to spit on the dead as he falls.
Still dragging his feet, the dead turn their heads at the sounds of the broken man amongst them. They begin to shamble off behind, calling others to follow their quest. He can hear their feet pound and scrape from behind, shuffling closer now.
He can hear a little song in his head that he used to sing when he was younger. “Summer breeze,” he whispers through parched lips, “makes me feel fine…” He smiles at the memory of listening to it over and over again with April. He hears her sigh at the music as he pulls her closer and kisses her forehead, tucking her hair behind her ear. If it weren’t for memories, the future would never be.
Waiting to Die ~ A Zombie Novel Page 15